Saturday, October 29, 2011

“In what can only be the stupidest public relations move in corporate history, financial behemoth Citibank reacted to customers trying to close their accounts today by… bringing in a ton of cops and having them arrested.”

After more than a month of protesting that has spread across the country, New York’s Occupy Wall Street is facing logistical challenges. With a heavy snowfall and cold front predicted, firefighters and police have removed all gasoline generators from the park.

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

You want to know why everyone in this country hates you and wants you dead, you big stupid fucking bank?

Here's why, pay attention:

(Reuters) – Bank of America Corp will pay $11 million to ousted executives Joe Price and Sallie Krawcheck, a large payout at a time when banks face protests over pay but smaller than the eight-figure packages some executives received before the financial crisis.

Krawcheck -- a former Citigroup Inc executive who came to Bank of America in 2009 and was one of the top-ranking women on Wall Street -- will receive a one-time payment of $5.15 million, according to separation agreements filed by the bank on Friday.

Price, a Bank of America veteran, gets $4.15 million. Each will also receive $850,000 over a one-year period.

Price was head of consumer banking and Krawcheck led wealth and investment operations.

Elevenmilliondollars? What the hell world are you inhabiting? Eleven million dollars for two departing executives because things didn't work out? I'm sorry, but were these two executives of Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez-level importance for your organization? Is that why there are severance deals like this in place? Or are you just completely psychotic?

It's not that this isn't your prerogative as a private company - it is. But seriously, numbers like these at a time when you're instituting added fees on customer accounts just sound farcical, almost like you're making these payments to get a reaction out people.

You look completely ridiculous with news like this at a time when thousands of people are massing in every major city in the country to make the case that you don't deserve to exist. At a time when you're being investigated for employing robo-signers just to maintain a certain level of foreclosures processed per month. At a time when you're laying off rank-and-file employees not by the hundreds, not by the thousands - but in the tens of thousands. At a time when retired seniors, desperately seeking income, have been pushed into annuities, life settlements, commodities and junk bonds because of the zero percent interest rate policy that was meant to nurse you and your balance sheet back to health - and this is what you do with the money? With OUR money?

Are you crazy?

You pay fired executives more in severance than the average American worker will earn in a lifetime. For most people on the outside looking in, this seems like it's from outer space, another world entirely. These numbers just do not exist to regular human beings, they cannot be fathomed. The ordinary American is not a class warrior or a woe-is-me whiner coveting the rewards of others - the ordinary American simply believes that extraordinary rewards should go to those who do extraordinary things, not to paper-pushing failures at parasite banks.

So let me give you a hint that will save you countless hours and millions of dollars spent on consultants and the public relations morons you keep on staff: This is why they hate you. This very type of thing, while just a single example, epitomizes the piggish mentality that has set you apart from everyone else. This is why they're marching against you and calling for boycotts and writing their politicians. And this is why your whole model and way of life is on its way to being dead. Forever.

You want to roll your eyes and make snide remarks about "dumb college kids" and "socialists"? Go ahead but you're be missing the point. Because it is the small business owner who's really been wronged here, not the fringe elements you mockingly dismiss. The business owner whose losses are not socialized like yours, the business owner without the government in his pocket, the business owner who is forced to play by the rules that you have paid to have written. He's not a hippie, he's not a Marxist...but he's waking up, dummy.

You blew the second chance you got with TARP to re-enter society as a productive component of commerce. You went back to bonus-swilling, full-retard mode as though nothing ever happened and 13 million people weren't sitting around in their post credit-bubble joblessness for three years now. Your tone-deafness and utter disconnection from the rest of the country has produced something extraordinary - You've managed to awaken one of the most indolent, lethargic and apathetic populaces in the history of the world. You've now stirred a slumbering nation of 300 million from it's Entennman's and Zoloft-induced stupor. America is awake now and it's pissed.

Thursday, October 13, 2011

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — The sponsor of the law that made it legal to carry a gun into bars in Tennessee is facing charges of possession of a handgun while under the influence and drunken driving.

Rep. Curry Todd, a Collierville Republican, was pulled over in Nashville late Tuesday, according to court documents. Police said he failed a roadside sobriety test and refused to take a Breathalyzer test. A loaded .38-caliber gun was found in a holster stuffed between the driver's seat and center console.

A police affidavit said Todd was unsteady on his feet, "almost falling down at times." Officers concluded that Todd was "obviously very impaired and not in any condition to be carrying a loaded handgun."

Todd posted bail of $3,000 and was released from jail Wednesday morning. He later released a statement saying, "I am deeply sorry for the events of last evening." He said he would make no further comments on the advice of his attorney.

Todd's GMC Envoy was stopped while going 60 mph in a 40 mph zone in a neighborhood surrounding Vanderbilt University, said police spokesman Don Aaron. The vehicle was weaving and crossed the double yellow lines, he said.

Aaron said Todd told the officers that he was coming from downtown Nashville even though his SUV was headed in that direction. The cruiser was not equipped with cameras to record the stop, the police spokesman said.

Todd told officers that he had consumed two drinks, according to the affidavit.

As a former Memphis police officer, Todd isn't required to have to have a permit to carry a gun in public, but state records show he has one anyway.

State law makes it a misdemeanor for anyone to consume alcohol while carrying a firearm in public, and those who violate that law are subject to losing their permits for three years.

House Majority Leader Gerald McCormick, R-Chattanooga, said it's too soon to say whether Todd will be stripped of his chairmanship of the House State and Local Government Committee.

McCormick said in a news conference that he had spoken briefly with Todd to tell his colleague he was "praying for him and being supportive of him on a personal basis."

McCormick said the arrest doesn't change his views about the guns in bars law.

"It's a bad idea to drink and carry a gun, obviously," he said. "I don't know the details of what happened with Rep. Todd last night, but I think he would agree me."

Todd's arrest was first reported by WSMV-TV.

Court documents don't indicate whether Todd had been drinking at a bar.

Todd sponsored a 2009 bill to let people with handgun carry permits take their weapons into businesses that serve alcohol, provided they don't drink. Although police and prosecutors spoke out against it, the measure passed and easily survived a veto from former Democratic Gov. Phil Bredesen.

A judge later declared the law unconstitutionally vague but the Legislature addressed those issues in a new version that became law last year.

During the 2009 debate over the bill, Todd assured lawmakers that gun permit holders would be careful about not violating the ban on drinking in bars or restaurants while carrying a gun.

"The burden is not going to be on the restaurant owner, it's going to be on the individual, because he's going to know that he has a chance there if he's caught to lose his gun permit forever," Todd said.

Faith and Don Peters were leaving a Lowe's home improvement store on Wednesday when they heard about Todd's arrest. Both retired Republicans agreed that Todd should be treated like any other citizen who gets in trouble.

"I feel you should be a law abiding citizen, especially if you serve as an example to the community," Faith Peters said.

Outside the same store, real estate appraiser Terry Smith, who said he played high school basketball with Todd in the 1960s, was saddened by the charges.

"I'd hate to jump to judge him," Smith added.

Todd, 63, also once played basketball for the University of Memphis.

Todd also drew national attention last year for saying in a committee hearing that illegal immigrants can "go out there like rats and multiply" after hearing that federal law requires the state to extend prenatal care to women regardless of their citizenship status because all children born in the U.S. are citizens.

Todd initially acknowledged that he used the wrong words and that he meant to say "anchor babies" — itself a term many consider offensive — but refused to apologize for the original remark.

Todd later changed course and said he would "apologize if the comment offended anyone."

WOOSTER -- Two more Amish men accused in beard-cutting attacks turned themselves in to the Holmes County Sheriff Wednesday morning.

Eli M. Miller, 32, and Daniel S. Mullet, 37, surrendered in connection with the recent attack on a fellow Amish man, a 74-year-old who had his beard cut during the incident. Both are charged with aggravated burglary and kidnapping.